All posts tagged: lab

DEEP Lab, SCIF, and the future of UK electric propulsion

DEEP Lab, SCIF, and the future of UK electric propulsion

Published by skeptic

The Innovation Platform spoke with Magdrive and the UK Space Agency to discuss the opening of the Disruptive Experimental Electric Propulsion Laboratory (DEEP Lab) at the Harwell Science and Innovation Campus A state-of-the-art laboratory has officially opened at the Harwell Science and Innovation Campus in Oxfordshire. DEEP Lab is designed to provide cutting-edge resources and collaborative opportunities to businesses engaged in aerospace and satellite engineering. Established by Magdrive with the support of the UK Space Agency’s Space Clusters Infrastructure Fund, DEEP Lab is set to revolutionise the UK’s capabilities in electric propulsion technology. By providing essential infrastructure for testing and developing next-generation propulsion systems, DEEP Lab aims to address critical gaps in the space sector, enhancing the UK’s competitive edge in the increasing global market for space technology. With the rise of small satellites and the demand for innovative solutions to meet the challenges of space exploration, this laboratory will serve as a vital hub for experimentation and testing. Companies will have access to specialised equipment and expertise, allowing them to rapidly prototype and assess …

Airbnb’s Brian Chesky plans to launch a new AI lab

Airbnb’s Brian Chesky plans to launch a new AI lab

Published by skeptic

Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky has had enough of merely being an artificial intelligence kingmaker. He now plans to back a new AI lab of his own. The news, broken by Bloomberg and confirmed to TechCrunch by a person familiar with the situation, marks Chesky as one of many Silicon Valley machers who are unsatisfied with the models coming out of the frontier labs. While AirBnB has adopted AI coding tools, Chesky said last year it hasn’t struck an LLM partnership because existing products weren’t quite ready. Still, Chesky has plenty of insight. He met Sam Altman in 2006 through Y Combinator, which incubated Airbnb, and stayed in touch. When OpenAI took off, he began meeting regularly with Altman to offer advice about managing a hypergrowth tech company. Chesky, who was reportedly considered a potential OpenAI board member, helped broker Altman’s return to power after its board of directors fired the CEO for lack of candor. Chesky advised Altman on public relations and rallied support for him among Silicon Valley bigwigs. Now, however, he appears to …

‘It shatters my heart’: the fosters taking care of stressed former lab beagles | Well actually

‘It shatters my heart’: the fosters taking care of stressed former lab beagles | Well actually

Published by Sam Flores

In May, 1,500 beagles were released from Ridglan Farms, a breeding and bioresearch facility near Madison, Wisconsin. The event made headlines. Soon, a deluge of tear-jerking videos followed, showing the lab beagles experiencing the outside world for the first time. Millions of people watched the dogs touching grass and instinctively paddling their paws at the sight of water. Immediately, the animal rescue organizations involved in the release were flooded with applications from people hoping to foster or adopt one of the dogs. “These are famous beagles! Everyone wants one,” says Shannon Keith, president and founder of the Beagle Freedom Project, which is helping place hundreds of the rescued dogs. “But they have to understand that these are not ordinary dogs, nor are they ordinary beagles.” The dogs were born and bred in the facility, says Keith. Many of them had never been outdoors, and “were quite frightened and shut down” when they were first brought out. “They have been through a lot,” she says. Allow Instagram content? This article includes content provided by Instagram. We …

Missing worker at high-security lab in N.M. found dead in remote forest

Missing worker at high-security lab in N.M. found dead in remote forest

Published by Sam Flores

Human remains discovered next to a handgun in a remote northern New Mexico forest were identified this week as those of a missing woman who had worked at a high-security federal lab. Melissa Casias was first reported missing almost a year ago from her home in Taos, N.M., where her daughter found her valuables — two phones, wallet, identification, laptop — still at home, but Casias nowhere to be found. Her newly confirmed death deepens the mystery around her disappearance, which is part of an FBI investigation into possible links among at least 10 dead or missing federal scientists or staff members involved in highly sensitive research tied to national security. Casias had been an administrative assistant at Los Alamos National Laboratory, where the first atomic bomb was developed and where nuclear weapon work continues, her family told local news outlets after her disappearance. The human remains were discovered in Carson National Forest on Thursday by a hiker, about two hours north of Los Alamos National Forest and two hours east of Taos, according to …

Hantavirus bombshell as 2 vials of deadly rat virus vanished from Australian lab in 2024 | World | News

Hantavirus bombshell as 2 vials of deadly rat virus vanished from Australian lab in 2024 | World | News

Published by Sam Flores

Two vials of hantavirus were among more than 300 vials of viruses that disappeared from an Australian lab in 2024. Alongside these vials, there were also nearly 100 vials that contained the Hendra virus (transmitted from horses to humans), and 223 vials contained the lyssavirus (rabies virus). At the time, it was said that the most probable cause of the “disappearance” was thought to be the loss of containers during transfer to a new freezer. An investigation was carried out by the Ministry of Health, who determined they were likely destroyed rather than stolen or lost. The information has resurfaced after the deadly virus infected passengers on board the MV Hondius ship, prompting many to ask the question again of what really happened to the missing vials. Three people – a 70-year-old Dutch man, his 69-year-old wife, and a German woman – have so far died after the outbreak linked to the cruise ship. British ex-policeman Martin Anstee, 56, and two other cruise passengers have arrived in the Netherlands for special treatment, while another patient …

The world’s largest explosion lab is ready for big booms. And yes, it’s in Texas.

The world’s largest explosion lab is ready for big booms. And yes, it’s in Texas.

Published by Jenni Sidey

Get the Popular Science daily newsletter💡 Breakthroughs, discoveries, and DIY tips sent six days a week. Everything is bigger in Texas, and that includes its controlled detonations. Texas A&M University recently revealed what they say is the world’s largest controlled explosion lab, where researchers can fill a nearly 500-foot metal tube with gas and ignite it in the name of science. They are calling it The Detonation Research Test Facility (DRTF). By precisely measuring what it takes to turn a simple flame into a massive, deadly detonation, researchers hope to make discoveries that could better prepare engineers to prevent gas leaks, and potentially inform ways to build explosion-resistant infrastructure. And all of that will require lots and lots of yeehaw inducing bangs. Located in Southeast Central Texas, the detonation tunnel is about six feet in diameter and stretches nearly the length of two football fields. Its metal exterior consists of three-quarter-inch steel walls and is covered in earth to muffle the sound—or try to, at least. Inside, the tube holds various sensors that can measure …

SAP bets .16B on 18-month-old German AI lab and says yes to NemoClaw

SAP bets $1.16B on 18-month-old German AI lab and says yes to NemoClaw

Published by skeptic

By OpenAI COO’s own admission last February, “we have not yet really seen AI penetrate enterprise business processes.” But for enterprise software giant SAP, whose stock has dropped significantly in 2026 in part from the “SaaSpocalypse,” the issue is still front and center. On Monday, the European heavyweight announced its intention to acquire German AI startup Prior Labs for an undisclosed amount. Pending regulatory approval, SAP plans to invest €1 billion (approximately $1.16 billion) into the business over the next four years to grow it into an AI lab focused on structured data — the tables and databases where enterprise information typically sits. SAP declined to disclose how much it spent on the acquisition itself, but sources told Pathfounders that this was a healthy exit: an “almost all cash” deal, with well over half a billion dollars in cash up front for the startup’s founders — Frank Hutter, Noah Hollmann, and Sauraj Gambhir. The trio co-founded Prior Labs just 18 months ago with a focus on tabular foundation models (TFMs) — AI models that can …

CIA agents killed in horror car crash on secret raid to destroy Mexico drug lab | World | News

CIA agents killed in horror car crash on secret raid to destroy Mexico drug lab | World | News

Published by Sam Flores

Two U.S. officials killed in a vehicle crash as they returned from destroying a clandestine drug lab in northern Mexico over the weekend were working for the CIA, according to a U.S. official and two other people familiar with the matter. Two Mexican investigators also were killed in the crash, which Mexican authorities said occurred while the convoy was returning from an operation to destroy drug labs of criminal groups. There have been discrepancies in the public accounts of what happened from U.S. and Mexican officials, which experts say underscores heightened American involvement in security operations in Mexico and across the region. The CIA’s involvement was confirmed Tuesday by the three with knowledge of the crash, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive intelligence matters. That the U.S. officials worked for the CIA was reported earlier by The Washington Post. It comes after days of contradictions from Mexican and U.S. authorities about the role that American officials played in an operation to bust a narco-laboratory in northern Chihuahua state. The lack of …

AI research lab NeoCognition lands M seed to build agents that learn like humans

AI research lab NeoCognition lands $40M seed to build agents that learn like humans

Published by skeptic

Investors are aggressively courting AI researchers to build startups that can make AI more reliable and efficient. Yu Su, an Ohio State professor leading an AI agent lab, said he initially resisted the pressure from VCs to commercialize his work. He finally took the leap last year and spun out his work into a startup when he saw that foundational model advances could make agents truly personalized. NeoCognition, a startup Su describes as a research lab developing self-learning AI agents, has just emerged from stealth with $40 million in seed funding. The round was co-led by Cambium Capital and Walden Catalyst Ventures, with participation from Vista Equity Partners and angels, including Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan and Databricks co-founder Ion Stoica. “Today’s agents are generalists,” Su (pictured left) told TechCrunch. “Every time you ask them to do a task, you take a leap of faith.” According to Su, the issue lies in a lack of consistency. Current agents, whether from Claude Code, OpenClaw or Perplexity’s computer tools, successfully complete tasks as intended only about 50% of …

Mississippi State physicist creates neutron star reaction in the lab

Mississippi State physicist creates neutron star reaction in the lab

Published by Jenni Sidey

For years, physicists have wondered whether one unstable form of copper might act like a traffic jam inside some of the most violent explosions in the universe. That question matters because those explosions, called Type-I X-ray bursts, are part of the cosmic machinery that helps build heavier elements. Hydrogen and helium dominated the early universe. Much of what came later, including the oxygen in the air and the iron deep inside Earth, had to be forged in stars and stellar blasts. Now, a team led by Mississippi State physicist Jaspreet Randhawa has directly measured a key nuclear reaction tied to that process. The result suggests the suspected slowdown is much weaker than scientists feared. Therefore, heavier elements have a clearer path to form during explosive bursts on neutron stars. “The universe began almost entirely with hydrogen and helium,” Randhawa said. “Every heavier element, from the oxygen we breathe to the iron in Earth’s core, was forged later in stars and stellar explosions. By identifying how stellar explosions build heavier elements, scientists gain a clearer picture …